Soyuz TMA-01M was a Soyuz flight that transported three members of the Expedition 25 crew to the International Space Station. TMA-01M was the 107th flight of a Soyuz spacecraft, and the first flight of the modernized TMA-M series. The spacecraft remained docked to the space station during Expedition 25, to serve as an emergency escape vehicle. The spacecraft's COSPAR was 2010-052A.

Soyuz TMA-01M is the first spacecraft of the new modernized Soyuz TMA-M series, developed and built by RKK Energia as an upgrade of the baseline Soyuz-TMA, which has been in use since 2002. 36 obsolete pieces of equipment have been replaced with 19 new-generation devices and the vehicle's total mass has been reduced by 70 kilograms (154 lbs). In particular, the old Argon-16 computer control system, which has been used on Soyuz ships for more than 30 years, has been replaced with a new digital onboard computer, the TsVM-101. Power consumption has been reduced throughout the ship.here are also changes to the spacecraft's structure, such as replacing the magnesium alloy used in the instrument module frame by aluminum alloy, to make the ship easier to manufacture.

The modernized Soyuz ship will also enable engineers to test new equipment which may also be used in Russia's next generationmanned space ship that is currently under development.

NASA astronaut Scott Kelly, part of Soyuz TMA-01M's crew, praised the ship's new displays, saying that they make flying easier and less operator intensive.

Two flight development tests are planned: Soyuz TMA-01M and Soyuz TMA-02M. The third ship, SSoyuz TMA-03M will be used for qualification tests. In addition to verifying the nominal operation of the spaceship, the testing will include verification of off-nominal modes, such as manual altitude control, issuing of orbital maneuvering pulses using four berthing and attitude thrusters, and flying around the ISS in manual control mode.

After the launch of Soyuz TMA-01M, Russian space officials said the new spacecraft performed normally with no problems of any significance. "Soyuz TMA-01M is a digital spacecraft, digital vehicle. As you saw today, it worked extremely well, it was an automatic flight, 100 percent automatic," said Vitaly Lopota, president RSC Energia.

The modified Soyuz TMA crewed spacecraft for transporting Crews to the ISS has been developed on the basis of a Soyuz TMA spacecraft. In the new version, the Argon-16 computer (introduced on Soyuz-T back in the 1970s) is replaced by the new TsVM-101 computer. The latter is a much more capable computer, is almost 10 times lighter (8.3 kg vs. 70 kg) and much smaller. The analogue telemetry system is also replaced by a smaller digital telemetry system called MBITS.

It is to provide rescue of the main crew of the station in emergency and delivery of visiting crews.

During the flight the spacecraft fulfills the following tasks:

delivery of a visiting crew consisting of up to three persons and small accompanying cargoes
constant availability of the spacecraft, attached to the station during its crewed flight, in the standby mode to be ready for emergency descent of the main crew onto the ground in case of hazardous situation on the station, cosmonaut illness or injury, etc. (assured crew return vehicle function);
planned descent of the visiting crew onto the ground;
returning to the ground, together with the crew, payloads of relatively low mass and volume
disposal of wastes from the station in the living compartment to be burned down in the atmosphere during descent.
During a pressure test, the descent module of vehicle №704 was damaged beyond repair. The descent module was replaced with the one, which was originally planned to be used in vehicle №707. This repaired vehicle received the serial number №704A and flew on the Soyuz-TMA 07M mission.

During the missions of both Soyuz-TMA 14M and Soyuz-TMA 17M, one of the solar arrays remained stuck after launch and deployed only during the docking with the ISS.